Past, Present and Future of Public Administration Degree Programmes in Poland
BETWEEN TRADITION AND MODERNITY
(Short story of public administration degree programmes in Leon Kozminski Academy of Entrepreneurship and Management in Warsaw)
Contains of the discussion papers proposed by Witold Mikulowski, PHD
LK Academy of Entrepreneurship and Management in Warsaw Poland
1. Introduction
1.1 Objectives and scope of the study
This paper intends to present an example of development of a new type of Public Administration programmes in Poland. In fact, the case of LK Academy of Entrepreneurship and Management is specific from at least three points of view.
Firstly, the LKAEM it is not classic university, but private Business School and its PA programmes are not part of the Law Department, like in other academic institutions in Poland, but belongs to the Department of Management and Administration.
Secondly (and subsequently), the development of the programmes curricula was not following the approach of mainframe of PA programmes in Poland attached traditionally to the Departments of Law and Administration of Polish universities. From the very beginning, the author of LKAEM programmes intended to be much more modern (more interdisciplinary, rather Public Management oriented), and to maintain a good balance between Law and other disciplines entering in the large scope of Administrative Sciences.
Thirdly, the PA degree programmes, belongs to few remaining programmes of higher education in Poland, which still have no official standards (required programme minima) approved by the Ministry of National Education.
The Ministry of Education approved and authorise successively LKAEM undergraduate, PA bachelor degree programme in 1998 and graduate master degree PA programme in 2002. All these programmes are followed now by 415 full time and part-time students[1].
Despite relatively successful development, the implementation of these programmes in accordance with their initial premises encountered certain problems. Initially more modern and innovative LKAEM PA programmes were recently modified and moved closer, to more classical, traditional approach, dominating in Polish system of higher education in this field. We will analyse and explain this phenomenon, as well as try to formulate lessons learn and recommendations for farther programs development and improvement.
The interest of this particular case study lays in fact, that many of these problems are common to the majority, if not all PA programs of higher education in Poland, independently of their varying institutional framework and other particularities.
1.2 Short presentation of the LK Academy of Entrepreneurship and Management
The LKAEM is commonly recognized as the one of the best private business school in Poland enjoying full academic rights of national universities stipulated by the Polish "Law on Higher Education"[2]. Starting from 1997 the Academy regularly occupies first or second rank among the best private higher educational institutions in prestigious rankings, published by weekly “Wprost” and “Polityka”, monthly ”Perspektywy” and daily “Rzeczpospolita”[3]. It figures also on the general list of 12 Polish university level institutions meeting international standards.
The Academy was founded in Warsaw 12 May 1993. Recognizing high academic standards observed within the Academy, the Ministry of Education has granted it full accreditation for a period of 25 years.
In 1998, Polish National Central Board of Degrees gave LKAEM the authorisation to grant PhD degrees – and in 2003 habilitated doctor (professor) degrees in the field of Economics, specialisation Management and recently also Economics. The Academy became the first private higher education institution in Poland to have such authorizations.
In 1999, as the first and the only school, not only in Poland but also in the entire Middle and Eastern Europe, the Academy received the accreditation of EQUIS (The European Quality Improvement System).
The Academy is governed by the Rector (and its cofounder) Prof. Andrzej Koźmiński, member of prestigious International Institute of Management, assisted by the President of the Board of Trustees, 3 Deputies (Vice-Rectors): for Scientific Affaires, for Students’ Affairs and for its 12 MBA and other Postgraduate Programs.
The Senate is the highest collegiate consultative body of the Academy, composed of the Rectors, all of professors (habilitated doctors), two representatives of lower level academic staff, as well as representatives of administrative and technical staff and students.
The Board of Trustees, oversees the management of the Academy on behalf of its founders. The Academy also holds a wide range of research centres, chairs and projects (some of them sponsored by PHARE, Polish Academic Research Committee and others) giving the faculties and students opportunities for intellectual development and entertaining very active relations and exchange programs with 34 foreign faculties and research centres all over the world.
The Academy has started its development with a Business Management programs and were progressively enlarging and upgrading its activities on other fields of social sciences. It offers presently undergraduate, graduate and postgraduate programs (including Ph.D. seminars in Management) and is delivering internationally recognized diplomas in: Management & Marketing, Finance & Banking, Public Administration, Law and Social Sciences (Sociology and Psychology). The Academy is offering also a big number of various postgraduate specialised programs including nine conducted in foreign languages (English, German and Russian)[4]
The Academy is organised on 3 departments or colleges (Kolegia): Management and Administration, Law and Finance and Banking and research centres. Kolegium of Management and Administration groups programs of Management and Marketing, Public Administration, European Studies and Social Sciences. Kolegia are placed under the authority of Dean assisted by Vice-Deans (one for each discipline). All post-graduate programs are place under the authority of one of the vice-rectors.
Currently the school owns 20,000 square meters in three buildings. It has over 5,500 students following regular, evening (weekends) and distance learning courses, and employs over 250 academic staff.
The Academy is currently conducting bachelor and master degree programs, both for full-time and part-time students[5].
2 General overview of higher education system and PA programmes in Poland
2.1 Institutional and legal framework of Polish higher education system
Legal system of Polish higher education distinguishes traditional, full right academic institutions: universities, academies and specialized school of higher education[6] , called professional schools of higher education. Institutions of higher education can be public as well as private and corresponding legislation includes certain rules governing private institutions, concerning more particularly non-academic aspects of their management.
The vocational schools of higher education can deliver only undergraduate bachelor degree programmes. However, they open the way to farther education, which can permit to obtain a master degree in full academic institutions. The full-academic institutions can be authorised to provide bachelor and master degree programs as well as uniform 5 years long graduate master degree programmes.
Both type of the institutions are placed under supervision of the Minister in charge of higher education, follow the same rules concerning organisation and quality of educational process and deliver the same officially recognised diplomas.
The differences between vocational and academic institutions of higher education lay mainly in the standards concerning the number and academic level of the teaching staff required to conduct the programmes, rather than in their contains or teaching methods.[7] Otherwise, there are no different standards for undergraduate programs in vocational and academic institutions and, in practice, both are often more academically (theoretically) than vocationally (practically) oriented. However, vocational schools are employing more often some professionals available in their direct environment (many of these schools were created in provincial centres were there are no academic type institutions).
The Minister in charge of higher education disposes of a consultative body – the Principal Council of Higher Education, which determines official list of the names of the programs and corresponding titles of the degrees. The same Council is adopting standards for different programmes’ contains (minimal number of teaching hours and list of compulsory matters) required for official authorisation to conduct such a program and to deliver corresponding diplomas.
As we have already mentioned, the Council did not yet adopt these standards for all recognised programs. It is mainly the case of relatively new and/or interdisciplinary programs like Public Administration or European Studies.
2.2 Evaluation system of higher education institutions and their programs
For supervision of the development of higher education institutions and implementation of the quality standards of their programs, the Minister in charge of higher education disposes of the State Accreditation Commission – a statutory consultative body created by the Act of 20th July 2001. The Act determines its mission and composition. The Statute of the Commission adopted in January 2002 determines its tasks, internal organisation and way of doing.
The Commission presents to the Minister its opinions and proposals concerning:
· Creation of a new higher education institution;
· Authorisation for given institution to conduct a higher education programs in concrete domain and of concrete level;
· Evaluation of the quality of education provided by the given program;
· Fulfilment of other conditions required by special regulations to conduct higher education activities.
The Commission is organised on teams, grouping programs belonging to the main families of scientific disciplines considered also as main fields of higher education. It is important to notice that Public Administration Programs are followed by the Team of Social and Law Studies and Managerial studies by the Team of Economic Studies. Therefore, the site visit teams evaluating PA programs can not include economists and specialists of management and organisation.
The process of evaluation of the quality of education contains the preparation by the concerned institution of the self-evaluation report, followed by the field visit of the team composed of the Commission members and designated experts. The self-evaluation report should follow the template adopted by the resolution of the Commission’s Executive Committee [8].
On the base of the evaluation report and the site visit, the evaluating team prepares its report containing the assessment of the fulfilment of conditions to provide the higher education required by the regulations and the opinion on the quality of delivered education. On the base of this report, the Executive Committee of the Commission adopts a resolution containing the assessment and its opinion and recommendations. This resolution is submitted to the Commission for approval. The assessment can rate the program as “outstanding”, “positive”, “conditional” or “negative”. In the case of the outstanding and positive rating the next evaluation will take normally place after 5 years. In the case of rating program as “conditional” the resolution of the Committee should contain the recommendations and the calendar of their implementation. The Commission transmits the resolution to the Minister and the institution concerned. The Minister decides to cancel or suspend the authorisation to run negatively evaluated program.
The periodic evaluation of each higher education program is compulsory and is organised systematically following pre-established calendar known in advance to the institutions concerned. The evaluation procedure was introduced recently and many programs in many institutions were never evaluated yet. In the case of LKAEM, only its Management and Marketing programmes were evaluated very recently in 2004. They were rated “outstanding” and are the first and only Management and Marketing programmes in Poland to obtained such a high rating.
2.3 Development of Public Administration degree programmes in Poland
Long tradition of Faculties of Law and Administration
Teaching public administration has in Poland a very long tradition. The first School of Administrative Sciences was created in Poland in the beginning of XIX century[9]. From this time, the Public Administration is considered as a subject of studies naturally and inseparably linked to the study of Law and now we have again the Departments of Law and Administration in our universities.
Under the communist regime, the Public Administration first appeared as special higher education programme in sixties, with a 3 years programme of Professional Administrative Studies created at certain Faculties of Law. This programme was organised exclusively on evening (weekend) courses mainly for the party, police, army and public administration officials occupying managerial position without any academic preparation. Later, the same population ambitioned to complete this programme, which was not considered as full higher education[10], a new two years programme of Complementary Master Degree Administrative Studies was introduced for the same population of working officials. In this way the 3 + 2 system was introduced in Poland well before Bologna, but only for limited types of studies (public administration, pedagogical colleges and technical schools of engineers) and for very specific students[11]. Progressively, this Public Administration programme was introduced also for ordinary students (but under the form of unique graduate 5 years long programme only) and the Faculties of Law were renamed the Faculties of Law and Administration. Because of the large number of candidates for external system, each Law faculty opened subsidiary centres. Some of them later became independent higher professional schools or even university level schools.
Development of PA degree programmes after the fall of communist regime
Under the communist regime, the state maintained monopoly of higher education[12]. The number of higher education institutions was limited and they infrastructures were limited too. They were recruiting a limited number of full time and part time students through competitive exams.
After the fall of communist regime and liberalisation of the economy, private schools of higher education started to spread very quickly all over the country. Demographic boom and rapidly growing number of young people with diplomas of secondary schools from one side rapid development of private sector, creation of local self-government and development of central government administration from other side, have created a big demand for better-educated staff with higher education degrees. This demand was particularly strong in the fields of business and public administration. In the first time, this trend has contributed to rapid development of private schools of higher education. Later on also public institutions, not only universities but also specialised schools of higher education started to develop a new degree programmes in most demanded specialities. In that manner we have now in Poland PA programmes run by public schools of engineers, of economics or agriculture. Nowadays, every regional, and even some sub-regional, town has at least one higher education, public or/and private, institution offering at least a bachelor and sometimes even master degree PA programme. The part-time, working students represents a big majority of the students attending theses programmes.